Artist Profile
harunemuri
Haru has always made music for herself first, but now the world is listening - even if they can't understand a word of the Japanese language in which she sings, raps and frequently screams. Haru has built a dedicated following thanks to extensive touring in Japan and other parts of Asia, and sold out numerous shows in Europe on her first trip there in 2019, which included a performance at the legendary Primavera Sound festival in Barcelona. "In any region of the world, there are some things people can't express in words, and sometimes even after writing lyrics, there are other feelings that I have left in me," she says. "That's when it's time to shout. If people feel connected and supported by that, I'm really happy about it." On her 2018 debut album, "Haru to Shura," Haru crafted songs with elements of "modern urban innocence, constraints and homogeneity, which therefore created a feel of tension and compactness." Over time, she says her beats and riffs have developed "a feel of more wideness in natural space" that would have been difficult to produce before. "I am now able to create sounds that are further closer to the ideal," she adds. "When I have ideas for songs, I am just an intermediary to help bring them to life. I strive to fulfill that role." Now, on the heels of five wildly different singles released over the past few months ("Bang," "Inori Dake Ga Aru," "Seventh Heaven", "Old Fashioned" and "Déconstruction") and a recent live session on KEXP, Haru is about to begin her first tour of North America, where interest in her music has reached new heights in the past two years. The new songs offer a fascinating glimpse into where Haru's music is headed and presage the hopeful 2022 release of a new full-length album. "Bang" and "Old Fashioned" splice Haru's rapped vocals atop heavy, distorted guitar riffs, while the vocal layering on "Inori Dake Ga Are" gradually becomes more and more disorienting, until Haru is shouting at the top of her lungs and the guitars reach a deafening volume. The shoegaze and alt-rock-leaning "Seventh Heaven" was written for the film ("Colorless"), which she says "helped me see a new side of myself. After hearing it in the movie, I was just astonished that I was able to write that music." At the upcoming shows, Haru is hopeful she can inspire her fans to (safely) "shout together, from their gut. I usually tell them to dance. If it can be a show like that, I'd be really happy to see it. I'd like to let all of that out on stage." As for the latest single "Déconstruction", Haru says the theme was inspired by the "binary opposition" inherent in differing ideals such as good and evil or socialism and capitalism. "They're actually being influenced by each other," she observes. "If one doesn't work, we go to the other. The world goes in a circle in that way. It has been going on for ages, and there's not a real good answer. We need to break that and deconstruct that."